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I scratched my jaw. “She was loopy from a sedative they gave her at the hospital, so I was helping her inside when her friend tried to take her from me. If you were watching from a distance, I suppose it might have looked…possessive.”
Grayson considered this. “So, who is she?”
I sighed. “My polar opposite.”
“She really the daughter of a killer?”
If only I had a big scotch inmyhand.
“She believes her father is innocent.”
I tried to place the unfamiliar pang in my chest as my mind floated into sad curiosity.
“Imagine what life must’ve been like in her shoes.” I cleared my throat. “Walking around with a scarlet letter on her chest as the child of a convicted killer. She could have let that hold her down. She could have run and hidden in seclusion, but she didn’t. She put herself through college and then law school and shows up every day in that courtroom with her head held with so much confidence you would never guess what she’s lived through.”
Grayson studied me. “You admire her.”
I tightened my jaw. “It doesn’t change things.”
“Screw Uncle Alexander and his legacy bullshit. You’ve never shown an inkling of interest in any woman beyond one night. You like her? Go for it.”
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
“It’s complicated.” Dad’s murder screwed me up in the head, made it impossible for me to get close to people.
Grayson took a slow sip of his drink, staring out the window.
“You know what she did when someone was in danger?” I asked, the pang growing into an all-out ache. “She rantowardit. Put herself in harm’s way to protect someone. She was fearless. Most people see danger, and they run the other way, but she lunged in front of it. She jumped into action, tried to save him, unlike…”
My brother turned his body, bringing his entire focus onto me.
“You were a kid, Hunter.”
I couldn’t look him in the eye.
“A nine-year-old cannot take on a grown man,” he said. “Let alone an armed one.”
“Easy for you to say.” I tried to swallow down the knot of shame in my throat, but it remained lodged there, where it’d set up a home all those years ago. “You weren’t the one home alone with him when it happened.”
He didn’t see and hear Dad choking on blood as he fought for his last breath.
“I can’t stand back and allow something to happen to her, too,” I added.
“Allow?” my brother hissed, his eyes flashing, probably realizing he wasn’t extinguishing my guilt. Probably realized he never could. “Look, if you like her and want to help keep her safe, go for it. But don’t you think it’s possible you’re overreacting?”
“I’m not.”
“You’ve convinced yourself you did nothing to save Dad, and then the first flicker of danger that pops up with this girl, you’re convinced she’s about to die, too. And that it’s your responsibility to save her.”
“It’s not aflickerof danger. She was attacked. And now that asshole thinks she has something worth choking her over.”
“My point is,” Grayson said, “your past might be like a magnifying glass to the present, making every danger seem larger. Amplifying your alarm for her.”
Maybe. But it didn’t change how I’d proceed.
“Do you think it’s possible that you don’t want to get close to her because you can’t stomach losing another person you care about?”
